Becoming a hardcore technician

Beginner Questions
1

Hello everyone!

I went live three months ago and so far i’m not regretting my decision… i had a 5% drawdown in November but recovered quickly in December with a 1% win. i’m down 16% as i write this post and it’s almost the end of the month. I became confident and increased my lot size only to have loosing streaks. My biggest loss was when a deal was made in the white house concerning the fiscal cliff and i expected EURUSD to rally but instead it went south. The most annoying part was that i spotted a shooting star in the 1hr TF that signaled to me that price is heading south, but i totally ignored it, relying on the fiscal cliff deal and thinking it was a mere price correction , i was wrong! it was a reversal…

If i had ignored the fiscal cliff announcement and focused on my chart i wouldn’t have lost, i would have exited my long position and monitor price action to jump in short…

I have resolved today to become a hardcore technician. I have decided to scale up to the D1 TF In other to filter minor intraday news events that causes price to fluctuate up and down.

Is there any rich technician out there?? cause there is this myth about technicians not being rich, i don’t know how true this is.

My question is- Can i completely forget about fundamentals and news events and happenings around the currency markets and just trade what i see in my charts?? considering the fact that i trade manually, has it been done??? is anybody doing it and making consistent profits??

Experienced traders, talk to me!!

2

Hey kingtony,

Take everything I say for a grain of salt, Im not live yet, but hard core demo’er, LOL…

Anyways, when news is approaching, its best to step aside for 20 minutes BEFORE and 20 Minutes AFTER the news has released…

The thing really is tho, the big guys already know the news, so they set up traps and whips to make money, and this happens hours before we know anything…

If you feel you need to be in the market, its best to set Limit orders, and always include leway for spread spikes, ( 08:30am OandA…)

Maybe look at the charts and find a good bar that seems stable, and use it as a inside bar, limit each side, and use TRAIL stops… They move fast as you know, and never know how far they will run, so I find Trailstops will ride it to a extent, of course till your TS is hit, but like I said, you never know, but at least you lock in fast pips…

Not sure about the technician thing, Im not so sure what that is or pertains to…

Have a Profitable week Kingtony,

3

Rich is a relative term.

But I trade pure price action on the daily chart. I leave fundamental guessing to everyone else. I’ve resolved to not try to get in on the top or bottom, but pull pips out from the middle of trends.

4

If you want to trade as a hobby… Then yes, ignore the fundamentals and just use technical analysis.

If you want to trade full time and have that as your only source of income… No, you will have a very hard time of it if you ignore fundamental analysis.

You need both…

5

I’m not saying i wanna trade the news. I wanna avoid it completely including fundamental analysis entirely and then focus only on my charts, do you think i can make long term profits from year to year completely ignoring fundamental analysis??

6

I devote over 15 hrs of my time everyday to forex, it’s either i’m trading or just thinking about trading, after investing this much time to a venture, why would i take it as a hobby? of course i wanna be able to make a living from it in the near future.

So what you are saying is that i can’t ignore fundamental analysis completely…“Noted” but i think i can

7

From your reply i understand that you don’t do fundamentals, so does this mean you are a successful technician??

8

So, You sit there and stare at the charts all day?

WHY!!??

Just kidden Bud, lol… You need to work on those chart hours, im at 11,500ish… I lost track… But i do know I hit 10,000 hours…

What do you want from this Career?

9

it’s great you have a goal and plan
but most pros use both technical+fundamental analysis

also when your using technical indicators/analysis alone, it’s best you trade short term only (couple minutes-couple weeks max)
but by trading with both technical+fundamental analysis, you have a tremendous edge against the crowd perhaps even in the same boat as a pro if not better
as we all know, we lose money the moment we enter a trade becoz of spreads
trading the market is a minus sum game
to win and survive, you must have a clear edge in the game

if 2 traders use the same technical analysis, neither has an edge
however, if 1 use both and other one use only technical analysis, you’re far ahead in the game

im not preaching fundamental analysis, and yes, technical analysis is the current trend in the game
but why not have both in your arsenal?

trading is like going to war, when you have proper equipment/gear you’ll have greater chance of survival
so other soldiers(traders) have a sword/gun(technical analysis) with them before they go to battle, so if you have both sword/gun(technical analysis) + armor/shield(fundamental analysis), we can confidently say you have better odds of survival before you enter the battle(trade)

sure of course there’s skill involved as well
if you believe your swords/guns skills outperform your opponents by all means just use swords/guns alone
and perhaps you could even argue, many dumb soldiers go in the arena naked(the dumb crowd), just having a weapon in your hand is enough
it’s possible, but why risk the chance? why not go to a battle that you’ll have the most favorable odds of survival?

before preparing for war, we often train, train and train some more to increase our skills and efficiency
then finally with proper gear/equipment we can dominate our enemies
what good is a gun if you dont know how to shoot? what good is it to shoot a gun but you dunno how to shoot efficiently

A professional soldier will try to make every single bullet count, an amatuer will just unload his rifle at anything that moves
soon you’ll run out of bullets, while the pros just raking up kills after kills with tons of ammo left in pouch

btw, the comparison between trader and soldier was used in elder alexander’s books
im just paraphrasing his words to you
haha
hope it helps

10

Yes i used to sit and just watch my charts almost all day cause i got fascinated about price action. But lately i have started entering trades and switch off my computer. Now i have further made a decision to look at my charts once a day, it’s gonna be difficult looking just once a day but if i must succeed in this then i need to discipline myself and follow my rules.

What i wanna get from this career??? making consistent profit monthly that will be enough to take care of my family

11

No, you can ignore it completely… But you more then likely will not be able to make it your only source of income if you do :slight_smile:

12

You are right bro! from now on i wanna trade like a SNIPER not a MACHINE GUNNER, i’m switching to the daily TF, it’s gonna be boring but it’s the way to go…I wanna do very well technically, i believe i can, it has helped me stay afloat(at least i have not blown my first account)all my losses have come from the angle of analyzing and following fundamentals

13

ARE THERE RICH/SUCCESSFUL TECHNICIANS OUT HERE??? TALK TO ME!

I wanna focus on technical analysis and be successful, someone tell me i can!

14

This is why I aim for 100% strike rate… Why go to war, if you think you have a chance of losing? Why sacrifice if your confident you may lose?

" You cant win every trade"!! WHY? WHY? WHY? NONSENSE… You play – to win --the game!!!

Like playing conservative defense when you have the lead, NONSENSE!!!

15

you know you get more trigger time as a machine gunner and tear everything down in sight, you’ll be the man with the most firepower in the team
also you have to be more responsible as well, and also the equipment, ammo + the machine gun will weigh you down, have to be physically and mentally fit to carry all the weight
i was a SAW(squad automatic weapon) gunner for a couple days-weeks in iraq, it was tough and heavy but hey it was challenging
when i got my rifle back, it felt a ton load lighter! i was overjoyed!

anyway, nothing wrong with being a sniper, they are part of the team as well
but you might have to wait for hours, days, months just watching birds fly and still no trigger time
probably require a bit more discipline as well, might have to be in position for hours/days but on constant watch, so wont have bathroom breaks, might have to piss your pants (im dead serious)

day vs swing vs position trading all has its plus and minuses
but most important have a proper plan, management and mindset and you’ll be on the road to success

anyway, good luck trading bro

16

I think you only want to hear what you wanted to hear…

Banker928 already told you straight up that in order to be successful in this business you need technical and fundamental. You will lose either way that’s a given…Take it easy…what’s the rush? Don’t you have any other job(s) to do outside of Forex? If not, then go find one…Be realistic…

Also, Forex is not the only way you can make money. You can make money via Part-time or Full-time job or business on the side…or walk someone else’s dog… babysit one of your neighbors babies…selling stuff on eBay… the list goes on… then invest what extra money you can make either in retirement fund… or real state property…

Sorry, I just can’t help it…please don’t take this personally but just something to think about.

[B]EDIT[/B]: It takes TIME to build WEALTH…

17

Basically it comes down to how much information you can handle while still making good quality analysis.

If you are a position trader then it is quie logical that you have some fundamental analysis behind your plan, mainly because you have time to do your analysis. However, I percieve that most people saying fundamental analyis actually refer to catching market sentiment (via combining news events) rather than calculating where the price should be. I would argue that one can catch that market sentiment looking on chart and get even better feel of what the sentiment is.

If you are trading short term you have limited time to analyse, so “fundamentals” is just another tool and everyone should decide on their own if time spent is worth edge recieved.

Sure “fundamentals” might provide additional edge, but how do you know that your “fundamentals” aren’t already discounted in price?

If you are a shorter term trader using price(s) as your primary tool, then it takes time and effort and “fundamentals” might just work against you. Personally I find “fundamentals” of very little value compared to what you can see and percieve from charts. Trading in general is full of misconceptions, half truths and total bull****… idea that one has to use both fundamental and technical analysis to be very successful is certainly one of them.

Good luck.

18

I’m self employed, i’m a salesman. I sell educational materials to pupils and schools, 3 hrs and i’m done for the day selling my stuff, so i have all the time to focus on forex…I’m passionate about succeeding in forex cause i know when eventually i make consistent profit, i will get people down here to fund me.

So pardon me if i really do need a particular answer

19

Are you a technician??

20

So are you “very successful” at trading?

The biggest misconception in trading is that price moves because of patterns and technical levels… Price moves because of news, monetary policy, capital flows, and politics… All fundamentals.